Integrated Synthesis of Media, Society and Behavior

Santa, Magical Thinking, Education trump Consequences

So, in a moment only Tony Robbins could love, I was doing my early morning stretches when my wife read the following:

Few things could be more dangerous than letting your children fall into the trap of believing what they do doesn’t matter. Teach them that there are consequences of their actions.Teach them that even small decisions and actions consistently made, have far-reaching effects.

But wait; didn’t we just go over a news article on Google that reported that a teacher was axed because she told the 7 year olds that Santa doesn’t exist? Teaching that in a school, no less.What is the world coming to? Oh-no, Batman, another liberal chop at family traditions and faith-based holidays. It wasn’t on CNN.com or Time.com, Reuters, the washingtonpost.com or wsj.com. Should I believe it?What should I do?

What are the consequences of the Santa thing? I certainly enjoyed it growing up. And we all have heard, “What was good enough for me is damn good enough for…”Oh, wait a minute. That was called upon by my parents concerning values that they wanted me to have….that weren’t true, good, or right. You know, buying GM cars that started on fire, racism, bigotry, sexism in business, education and even dictums on whom to marry.

Hummm… seems there is just one more set of conflict of beliefs. What we do is a testament of our values.We thus value the stuff of our traditions more than we value the truth or all that other stuff we teach in school.…We could use this relational logic to teach intelligent design in schools, maybe a course in Wicca and another in Karma for Tots at the YMCA or JCC.

Should we really be surprised that people go postal or freak out in less dramatic fashion when these ‘absolute’ rules from our parents, teachers, and representatives change?

My sister’s response: “Well as long as it doesn’t hurt anyone (another stellar admonishment that the end justifies the means…) why not have Santa, the Easter Bunny and a Virgin Mary?”

Besides that, consequences are complicated even if they are universal. Myths are fun and simple and that is what we need today so we don’t have to deal with the antecedents that result in foreclosure, bankruptcy, layoffs, SEC fraud and bailouts.

Considering the need for fun and distractions, you might consider a small but compact 22 cal pistol as a gift for your child or perhaps some Mary Jane that isn’t a shoe.

They have antecedent elements that can’t be known or expressed, a larger context for what is written exists, and my favorite, there are whole series of consequences that exist that are interesting to some and less interesting to others including the principals in the story.

On the other hand, if I run over in the mouth, as the expression goes, no one will read or complete even the incomplete thoughts being expressed. Consequently, I try to keep the stuff I write to two pages of text… moving toward 1.25 these days as everyone is so busy.

In that blog what I neglected to point out and others did it for me in another medium, the consequences to the teacher were clear and, noting she was a temp, she could have calculated that being fired was in the realm of possible outcomes… but, maybe not…

Now one question has been peaked by your comment:
“How would it be tied up or brought to completion?” My initial hit in the head was that a teacher told the truth and was fired to telling it in a school where children are sent to get the [culture’s semblance] of the truth.

The story pointed out to me the contrasting point that ‘we value some traditions be taught in schools more than the available truth.’ Thus, not even ‘truth’ or ‘the value of teaching truth’ is an absolute.